The development of health-related quality of life (HRQL) instrument in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is increasing rapidly in China, but few studies focus on their necessity. This study explores the necessity of the development of TCM instruments from both theoretical and practice perspectives, and aims to explain whether the adoption of the cross-medical style is valid. Through theoretical analysis, both TCM and Western medicine instruments show the same objectives, whereas TCM instruments are more suitable for the Chinese social behavior, customs and expectations. In practical analysis, 47 TCM instruments were identified, among which 17 had 18 corresponding Western medical instruments. In the domains layer, except for physiological, psychological and social factors, TCM instruments focus more on the harmony between body and spirit, humanity and nature or human and society and the constitution, etc. In the facts layer, TCM instruments focus on the emotions, initiative social intercourse, TCM symptoms, diet, sleep, taste, feces and urine, etc. In addition, significant differences existed in the methods of information selection. There is no need to modify cross-medical style research except when TCM characteristic terms exist, but attention must be paid to the influence of culture in different areas. Therefore, the TCM instruments can resolve the limitations of the application of Western medical instruments to the Chinese setting, while also having remarkable abilities of information coverage and detection. Both forms of instruments have the capacity and requirement to inter-communicate with each other in order to serve the whole Chinese cultural system. Generally speaking, there is no need to modify the instruments in cross-medical style research. But this point requires further demonstration in the rigorous designed clinical trials.

Objective:To explore the mechanism of Dabuyuanjian in Against alzheimer's disease(AD)through network phar-macology and molecular docking technology,and to verify the molecular mechanism discovered by animal experiments.Methods:Net-work pharmacology was used to analyze the active ingredients and targets of AD in the treatment of large supplementary yuan decoc-tion.The core components of the drug were verified by molecular docking with the core protein by using AutoDock and PyMOL soft-ware.AD model mice were treated with Dabuyuanjian,and the core pathways which discovered were verified.Results:A total of 80 active ingredients and 107 disease targets were screened out.Dabuyuanjian had 95 targets in the treatment of AD,of which 35 were core targets.GO enrichment found that it mainly involved in programmed cell death process,apoptosis process and signal transduction regulation,etc.KEGG signaling pathway enrichment found that it mainly involved PI3K/Akt signaling pathway,Wnt signaling pathway,AMPK signaling pathway,etc.Morris water maze experiment showed that Dabuyuanjian could reduce the escape latency of AD mice,and increase the number of crossing platform and time's target quadrant.Immunohistochemistry(IHC)showed that Dabuyuanjian could increase the number of positive labeled-NeuN cells in the hippocampal CA3 region of AD mice.Immunofluores-cence(IF)showed that Dabuyuanjian could inhibit the expression levels of(GFAP)and ionized calcium-binding protein 1(IBA1)in the hippocampal CA3 region of AD mice.Western blot experiments showed that Dabuyuanjian could increase the expression levels of phosphorylated adenylate-activated protein kinase α(AMPKα)and silent information regulator 1(SIRT1)in the hippocampus of AD mice.Conclusion:This study explores the mechanism of Dabuyuanjian against AD,and find that Dabuyuanjian can improve cognitive impairment,neuron loss and neuroinflammation via activating AMPK/SIRT1 signaling pathway of AD.